Name and Form

Recently, a couple of key quotes from the Rig Veda have come around again and I thought it might be worth touching on this remarkable set of texts. There is an old Sanskrit saying, “knowledge in books, remains in books.” But the Vedas are something deeper. Veda means knowledge. They are a recording of knowledge itself. Read superficially, they may appear to describe mundane things like cows and farms. But heard more deeply, they are the flow of human evolution itself. The Rig Veda illustrates the stages of Unity.

First, 2 quotes.

“The verses of the Veda exist in the collapse of fullness in the transcendental field, the self-referral consciousness, the Self, in which reside the Devas [celestial beings], the laws of Nature responsible for the whole manifest universe.

He whose awareness is not open to this field, what can the verses accomplish for him? Those who know this level of reality are established in evenness, wholeness of life.”
— Rig Veda 1.164.39

“Go together, speak together, know your minds to be functioning together from a common source, in the same manner as the devas [celestial beings], in the beginning, remain together united near the source.

Integrated is the expression of knowledge, an assembly is significant in unity, united are their minds while full of desires. For you I make use of the integrated expression of knowledge. By virtue of unitedness and by means of that which remains to be united, I perform action to generate wholeness of life.

United by your purpose, harmonious be your feelings, collected be your mind, in the same way as all the various aspects of the universe exist together in wholeness.”
— the closing stanzas of the Rig Veda 10.191.2-4

Historically, the Rig Veda is thought to have originated in the NW of present India in the “land of the seven rivers” about 5,000 years ago. It was handed down orally through family traditions for thousands of years until it was assembled into books to avoid its loss some 2,000 years ago. Why was it considered so valuable? It is an experiential blueprint.

What is not commonly understood in most readings and translations of the Vedas is that they are encoded experiences. Unlike most languages like English, the Sanskrit language has a direct relationship between the sound of the word and it’s form. The form of an object is of course its meaning.

At a subtle level of existence, vibration arises which causes what we can describe as subtle form. This is the foundation of what follows and becomes our experience of the world. This process is generally recognized with other terminology in Physics, in the geometry of Buckminster Fuller, and descriptions like I outlined in Deepest Being.

That subtle vibration can be experienced as sound. You have of course heard of the famous primordial sound, Om or Aum. Every object and experience is founded in vibration. That foundation is known as name and form, a level where the sound of an objects foundational vibration can be experienced as it becomes form.

The sounds of Sanskrit match the form elicited. If a person is able to stay aware at a subtle level and listen to the Vedas, they will re-experience what is encoded in the stanzas. Kind of movies for yogis, only about deep truths or cognitions, not cowboys. The first quote above describes this.

This is one of the interesting aspects of our time. As the global consciousness opens and awakes, we rediscover truths that have been in front of us all along. Only now we can see. It is only beginning.